INDIAN LAND, South Carolina – Twenty-five years ago, Ni Meijuan earned $19 a month working the spinning machines at a vast textile factory in the Chinese city of Hangzhou.
25年前，倪美娟（音譯）還在中國大陸杭州市的一家大型紡織廠裡操作紡紗機，月薪19美元。
Now at the Keer Group's cotton mill in South Carolina, which opened in March, Ms. Ni is training American workers to do the job she used to do.
如今，倪美娟在科爾集團今年三月在美國南卡羅來納州開設的棉紡廠裡工作，培訓美國工人，教他們如何做自己以前做過的工作。
"They're quick learners," Ms. Ni said after showing two fresh recruits how to tease errant wisps of cotton from the machines' grinding gears. "But they have to learn to be quicker."
「他們學得很快，」向兩名新進員工展示完如何梳理紡織機研磨齒輪上殘留的棉絮後，倪美娟如此表示。「可是他們還得學得更快才行。」
Textile producers from formerly low-cost nations are starting to set up shop in America. It is part of a blurring of once seemingly clear-cut boundaries between high- and low-cost manufacturing nations that few would have predicted a decade ago.
來自先前成本低廉國家的紡織品生產商，已經開始在美國設廠。由此亦可見，高成本與低成本生產國之間曾經顯得十分清楚的界線已經開始泯滅，而這在十年前是少有人料想得到的。
Textile production inChinais becoming increasingly unprofitable after years of rising wages, higher energy bills and mounting logistical costs, as well as new government quotas on the import of cotton. At the same time, manufacturing costs in the United States are becoming more competitive. In Lancaster County, where Indian Land is located, Keer has found residents desperate for work, even at depressed wages, as well as access to cheap and abundant land and energy and heavily subsidized cotton.
工資、水電費、物流成本連年上漲，加上中國政府對棉花進口實行新的配額限制，紡織品生產在中國越來越不賺錢。在此同時，美國的製造成本卻越來越有競爭力。科爾集團在印第安蘭德所在的蘭開斯特郡發現，就算工資壓低，當地居民仍然渴望上工，此外，當地還有大量便宜的土地和能源，以及高額補貼的棉花。
Politicians, from the county to the state to the federal government, have raced to ply Keer with grants and tax breaks to bring back manufacturing jobs once thought to be lost forever.
從郡到州再到聯邦政府，美國各級政界人士不斷爭相提供科爾集團各種補貼和減稅優惠，希望贏回一度以為已經一去不回的製造業職缺。
The prospect of a sweeping Pacific trade agreement that is led by the United States, and excludes China, is also driving Chinese yarn companies to gain a foothold here, lest they be shut out of the lucrative American market.
美國主導的《跨太平洋夥伴協定》範圍廣泛，中國卻被排除在外。這個前景同樣驅使中國紡織企業前往美國取得立足之地，以免被排除在獲利豐厚的美國市場之外。
Keer's $218 million mill spins yarn from raw cotton to sell to textile makers across Asia. Keer still spins much of its yarn in China, importing the raw cotton from America, but that is changing.
科爾集團價值2.18億美元的棉紡廠將原棉加工成棉紗，賣給亞洲各國的紡織品生產商。雖然科爾集團繼續從美國進口原棉，在中國加工大部分棉紗，但這種情況正在改變。
"The reasons for Keer coming here? Incentives, land, the environment, the workers," Zhu Shanqing, Keer's chairman, said on a recent trip to the United States.
科爾集團董事長朱善慶日前訪問美國時說：「科爾到這裡來的理由是什麼？獎勵措施、土地、環境，還有工人。」
"In China, the whole yarn manufacturing industry is losing money," he added. "In America, it's very different."
「在中國，整個棉紡業都在賠錢，」他又說，「在美國，情況大不相同。」
Since Beijing and Washington resumed trade relations in the early 1970s, the United States has mostly run a huge trade deficit, as Americans consumed billions of dollars in cheap electronics, apparel and other Chinese goods.
自從1970年代初期北京和華府恢復貿易關係以來，美國人消費了數十億美元的廉價電子產品、服裝以及其他中國商品，以致美方幾乎一直有高額的貿易逆差。
But surging labor and energy costs in China are eroding its competitiveness in manufacturing. According to the Boston Consulting Group, manufacturing wages adjusted for productivity almost tripled in China in a decade, to about $12.47 an hour last year from $4.35 an hour in 2004.
但中國的勞動和能源成本飆漲，侵蝕了製造業的競爭力。根據波士頓諮詢公司的資料，過去10年間，中國根據生產力調整後的製造業工資幾乎漲至3倍，2004年的時薪只有4.35美元，去年已漲到12.47美元。
In the United States, manufacturing wages adjusted for productivity have risen less than 30 percent since 2004, to $22.32 an hour, according to the consulting firm. And the higher wages for American workers are offset by lower natural gas prices, as well as inexpensive cotton and local tax breaks and subsidies.
根據波士頓諮詢公司的資料，生產力調整後的美國製造業工資，2004年以來漲不到30%，目前時薪為22.32美元。美國的天然氣價格更低，棉花也便宜，加上地方提供的減稅和補貼，這些都抵銷了美國工人工資高出的部分。
Today, for every $1 required to manufacture in the United States, Boston Consulting estimates that it costs 96 cents to manufacture in China. Yarn production costs in China are now 30 percent higher than in the United States, according to theInternational Textile Manufacturers Federation.
波士頓諮詢公司估算，在美國需要1美元的製造成本，在中國要0.96美元。根據國際紡織聯盟的資料，中國的棉紗生產成本比美國高出30%。
"Everybody believed that China would always be cheaper," said Harold L. Sirkin, a senior partner at Boston Consulting. "But things are changing even faster than anyone imagined."
「所有人都認定，中國的生產成本總是比較便宜，」波士頓諮詢公司資深合夥人哈樂德．L.塞金說，「但情況變化的速度比所有人想像的都快。」
Rising costs in China are causing a shift of some types of manufacturing to lower-cost countries like Bangladesh, India and Vietnam. In many cases, the exodus has been led by the Chinese themselves, who have aggressively moved to set up manufacturing bases elsewhere.
中國成本上升導致某些類型的製造業轉往孟加拉、印度以及越南等成本更低的國家。很多情況下，帶領製造業大出走的是中國企業，他們一直積極前往其他地區設立製造基地。
From 2000 to 2014, Chinese companies invested $46 billion on new projects and acquisitions in the United States. The Carolinas are now home to at least 20 Chinese manufacturers.
2000年至2014年間，中國企業在美國的新專案和併購的投資總額已達到460億美元。至少有20家中國製造業者在南、北卡羅來納州設立據點。
"I never thought the Chinese would be the ones bringing textile jobs back," said Keith Tunnell, president of theLancaster County Economic Development Corporation.
蘭開斯特郡經濟發展公司總裁凱斯．童尼爾說：「我從沒想到把紡織業工作機會帶回來的，會是中國人。」
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